"Roar!"
"Roar!"
"Roar!"
Hundreds of Gillian roared in unison, following Hubert Allen.
With each roar, Ronan felt a slight obstruction in the spiritual pressure within him.
"Is this a combination attack?"
He hadn't expected this Adjuchas to be able to command so many Gillian to launch a combined attack.
Ronan felt a slight headache.
"You carry Ian Grey's aura. That fool deserved to die. He even exposed my spiritual pressure to lure you here. A Hollow actually wields a Shinigami's Zanpakuto? Interesting!"
A Hollow, only four or five meters tall, half-human and half-snake, flew out of the giant tree's nest, standing on the tree trunk and looking down at Ronan.
"You alone dare to dream of killing me? You're simply courting death! The moment you killed Ian Grey, the spiritual pressure I left in his body sensed it. That's why I've been on full alert, waiting for you."
Ronan looked up at the half-human snake on the tree trunk, which was quite small compared to him. The powerful spiritual pressure emanating from its body clearly indicated that it was the leader of this group of Gillian, and the unusual spiritual pressure previously found within that special Gillian belonged to the Adjuchas before him.
This was Ronan's first time encountering a proper Adjuchas, so he was curiously observing his opponent.
"Now, I'll give you a chance to pledge loyalty to me. Mutilate your form and let me plant my snake venom, then swear allegiance to me, Hubert Allen. How about I spare you this time?"
The Adjuchas named Hubert Allen spoke again. Evidently, like the previous half-human scorpion, he mistook Ronan for an Adjuchas.
As for his demand that Ronan mutilate his form, it was naturally to make Ronan fall from the Adjuchas rank. However, what he never expected was that Ronan was not only not an Adjuchas, but not even a Gillian—just an ordinary Giant Hollow.
"Snap!"
Hubert Allen snapped his fingers, and hundreds of Gillian around Ronan simultaneously began to charge their Cero, all aiming at Ronan.
Seeing this, Ronan immediately felt a headache.
After a brief silence, Ronan, holding his sword in his right hand, chopped off his own left hand with a single strike. In an instant, Ronan's severed left arm gushed out like a crimson fountain.
"I... offer... my loyalty... to you, Lord Hubert Allen."
Ronan threw the Zanpakuto from his right hand to the ground, picked up his severed left arm with his right hand, and held it high towards Hubert Allen.
Seeing Ronan's series of actions, Hubert Allen was first stunned, then burst into laughter:
"Hahaha, good! I like decisive fellows."
He immediately snapped his fingers again, and the hundreds of Gillian around them simultaneously stopped charging their Cero.
Then, with a Sonido, he appeared before Ronan, about to pick up and enjoy the severed arm Ronan held high.
But he suddenly noticed that the severed arm, which had been bleeding profusely, had flesh rapidly wriggling, and in an instant, the left arm regenerated. The regenerated left arm was holding a dark golden lightning whip, which shot towards Hubert Allen.
"This is, Ra..."
"Whoosh!"
Hubert Allen, having reacted, retreated at extreme speed, but the lightning whip followed him like a persistent maggot. His speed was fast, but Ronan's lightning whip was even faster, directly hitting his mask head-on.
"Roar!"
The half-human snake, struck head-on by the lightning whip, let out an earth-shattering roar. Looking closely, a gap had been directly blasted into the mask on his face!
Trickles of crimson blood flowed down his cheek from the gap in the mask.
"You dare to damage my body!!!"
Hubert Allen screamed maniacally. His body was damaged, and it was the most crucial part—his mask. This meant that from now on, he would no longer have the chance to evolve into the highest-ranked Vasto Lord.
He would also need to continuously devour Gillian just to barely maintain himself from falling from the Adjuchas rank.
This cunning Adjuchas not only possessed Speed Regeneration, which all Adjuchas coveted most, but he had also ruined his path to evolution.
"I'll tear you apart alive!
I'll tear you apart alive!"
Hubert Allen screamed maniacally, intending to command the swarm of Gillian to form a battle formation and kill Ronan.
How could Ronan give him a chance? With a wave of his hand, the Zanpakuto on the ground automatically returned to his hand. Then, he immediately followed with Sonido, striking at Hubert Allen's face repeatedly.
The half-human snake could only similarly use Sonido to retreat rapidly. At the same time, his fingernails instantly elongated. The ten fingernails, carrying black and red spiritual pressure, shot out like cannonballs, colliding with Ronan's sword light and stirring up a sky full of smoke and dust.
"Damn it! You despicable sneak attacker!"
Ronan's unexplainable combo of feigned surrender followed by a sneak attack completely stunned Hubert Allen.
"Noisy!"
Ronan ignored Hubert Allen. He slightly raised his left hand, and a black and red Cero charged in an extremely short time, blasting towards his face.
Hubert Allen's snake tail also condensed a Cero, also a beam of black and red Cero, which collided with the Cero unleashed by Ronan.
"Boom!"
The two Cero collided, stirring up a sky full of smoke and dust.
Hubert Allen's Cero actually arrived first, penetrating Ronan's Cero and blasting a bloody hole in Ronan's waist and abdomen.
"Cough cough, as expected, challenging an Adjuchas two ranks higher is still a bit difficult!"
Currently, if Ronan were to solely compare spiritual pressure, he was stronger than the special Gillian, Ian Grey, whom he had fought before. However, there was still a certain gap compared to a genuine Adjuchas. The reason he was able to injure him was due to Ronan's unexpected sneak attack.
"Although Ronan succeeded in his sneak attack, shattering his mask and causing his form to be damaged, the weakening and degeneration of spiritual pressure is a long process. Hubert Allen is still a genuine Adjuchas.
The more this kind of moment, the less one can show timidity. The flesh in Ronan's abdomen wriggled, and Speed Regeneration activated, fully recovering his injuries in an instant.
Using Speed Regeneration to heal such injuries placed a great burden on his spiritual pressure, so he decided to go all out, aiming for a quick kill.
At this moment, Hubert Allen, having recovered his senses, watched the injuries he had inflicted on Ronan being healed again by Ronan's Speed Regeneration.
"Damn it, if I had Speed Regeneration, I could repair my form..."
An emotion called jealousy instantly filled Hubert Allen's entire body, so he began to command his momentarily stunned Gillian army to unleash Cero and blast Ronan.
At the same time, Ronan knew he couldn't delay any longer. If he dragged it out further and allowed the Gillian battle formation to surround and kill him, he would surely die.
So, he gathered all his spiritual pressure and unleashed the strongest strike he could.
"Thunderclap Slash!"
This strike was a combination of the Zanjutsu he learned from Ito Kai's memories and his own Flash Lightning ability. This was Ronan's trump card!